Wednesday, May 05, 2010

Letters to Our Younger Selves

Ellyn Spragins and I first connected when she commented on a blog post in which I had included a copy of a letter to my younger self that I had written in 2008. It was inspired by a contest in Marie Claire magazine that was based on Ellyn's books. I never actually entered the contest, but two years later, my letter led to a personal invitation from Ellyn to host one of the inaugural "Letters to My Younger Self" Parties. After I agreed, she sent the invitations, party kit, a free copy of her latest book to reference at the party, which had a personalized inscription from Ellyn to me, and swag for the gift bags (which included products from Neutrogena, Trish McEvoy and Suze Orman). Virtually all I had to do was be a host. And since I organized a potluck picnic, I spent less than $100 on pens, gift bags, champagne, orange juice and disposable cups, plates and eating utensils).

In a note to the party hosts on March 6, 2010, Ellyn mentioned that there would be nearly 50 LTMYS Parties taking place across the United States during the week of April 30-May 2 - an initiative that she is developing into a product associated with her books. Among us, she noted, were dear family members, treasured friends, neighbors, readers, attendees and organizers of her speeches and Letters to My Younger Self Seminars - women spanning age ranges from their twenties to their sixties.

And so it came to be that seven of my 20- and 30-something girlfriends gathered in Central Park on Sunday, May 2, for our own LTMYS Party - a picnic brunch with discreetly-contained mimosas (hey, Mayor Bloomberg said it was ok) and delicious snacks (most notably, lemon-artichoke pesto and sliced baguettes from Zabars). We shared our potluck snacks, drank premium orange juice spiked with cheap champagne (except me since my bicycle training rides are getting longer), enjoyed small talk and laughter, and then listened while three friends read aloud from Ellyn's book - letters by Diane Von Furstenberg, Bobbie Brown and Barbara Walters. Finally, under the cool shade of a large tree at the north end of Sheep Meadow, we began our own letters. Except me again. I just continued eating since I had already written a letter to my younger self and posted it on my blog ... hence the reason I am holding a laptop in our group photo.

You’ll realize something new about yourself often. You won't seek to constantly reinvent yourself, yet you might not ever really know everything about you because different parts of you will change – sometimes frequently. This should probably bother you, but it won’t.
You’ll wish you were wittier, and you’ll be a sucker for a sense of humor. You won’t fall in love easily, you won’t get attached easily, and you’ll have to be both of those things if you’re going to get jealous easily; you’ll be able to thank a military-brat upbringing for that. You will be nominated for the "Most Friendly" Senior Superlative at your second high school, and you’ll be a "relatively nice" New Yorker 10 years later. But you’ll have a dark side, and you generally won’t trust those who don't. You’ll like to step back and absorb certain moments so that you can remember the details; you’ll do that most often when your friends are laughing.

You’ll crave cliché “Sex and the City” moments because it’s how you once pictured your life – minus, of course, the Manolo Blahniks, Upper East Side brownstones, and voluminous consumption of Magnolia Bakery cupcakes without gaining a pound. Your narrative thoughts and meaningful conversations won’t be set to background music, but you’ll have the fantasy in syndication and the real thing right outside your window. You won’t worry that your life is becoming a cliché because there will be a reason that you are not the first to live life the way you’ll choose to live it. And you’ll want to be Melanie Griffith at the end of Working Girl when she calls her best friend and says, "Guess where I am right now."

When you write this letter, you still won’t know who you are exactly, but you’ll realize it and be ok with it. And you’ll see that the only thing that matters for any of us in the end is that we once existed. So laugh more, love more, live more. Because you can.

Love Always,Your 28-Year Old Self

P.S. And when you're 30, you'll cycle across North America [2010 revision].

Quotable NYC

"Courtney's early chitchats with me were not filled with that kind of insane intensity that really naive people have when they're fresh off the boat in New York ..."~ Alan Hunter, Former MTV VJ, of Courtney Cox, E! THS "Friends"

"One belongs to New York instantly, one belongs to it as much in five minutes as in five years."~ Thomas Wolfe

"It would be childish of us to deny that our lives weren't changing. But for this night, none of us were going anywhere. That's the thing about really good friends and a really great Manhattan."~ Carrie, "Sex and the City"

More Quotable NYC

"In Washington, the first thing people tell you is what their job is. In Los Angeles you learn their star sign. In Houston you're told how rich they are. And in New York they tell you what their rent is."~ Simon Hoggart

"I can't wait to get back to New York City where at least when I walk down the street, no one ever hesitates to tell me exactly what they think of me."~ Ani Difranco

“It’s not the meaning of life, Alfred, it’s the feeling of life. Look at that park down there! Just think of how many loves lost and found in it, how many first kisses kissed, how many Frisbees lost, and just remember that is your park, my friend. And you've got your whole life to walk though it.”~ Zak Orth to Freddie Prinze Jr. referring to Central Park in Down to You (2000)

"Practically everybody in New York has half a mind to write a book - and does."~ Groucho Marx

"There's a spot in Central Park ... where if you sit there long enough, the entire city walks by."~ Matthew Perry to Salma Hayek in Fools Rush In (1997)